Prague, Aug 23 (CTK) – The Czech anti-trust office (UOHS) took part in the international competition of anti-monopoly offices staged by Global Competition Review (GCR) in the past nine years, but now it has decided to shun it in reaction to its sharply worsened results, Lidove noviny (LN) wrote on Wednesday.
Originally, the UOHS (the Office for the Protection of Economic Competition) fared well in the annual contest, but since 2014, it has always finished in the worst rating category where it joined its counterparts from countries such as India, Romania and Denmark, the daily writes.
The Czech anti-trust office has refused to take part in the contest this year, GCR editor Pallavi Guniganti has written to LN.
As an argument for its decision, the UOHS says the international rating cannot be considered relevant.
A total of 38 countries took part in it this year, compared with last year’s 39.
It was the Czech UOHS that has voluntarily dropped out from the contest, Guniganti said.
“We consider the method of assessing the competing offices unobjective, since it prefers subjective views of defence lawyers influenced by the course of administrative proceedings that take place before the UOHS,” UOHS’s spokesman Martin Svanda has written to LN.
The GCR completes its ratings based on information from more sources, the daily writes.
From each assessed office, it receives detailed information about its work, including data on its staff’s average age and the pay of the office head.
Another source are the reactions to the office’s performance from outside. For this purpose, the GCR addresses specialists such as lawyers, economists and journalists who are in contact with the assessed office.
The GCR’s final report starts with a verbal assessment containing the above specialists’ personal opinions.
By cancelling its participation, the UOHS has also reacted to personal criticism targeting some of its high representatives, Svanda said.
Last year, the CCR assessment lashed out at UOHS chairman Petr Rafaj. It said observers both inside and outside the competing office reproach Rafaj for his political past, LN writes.
It says Rafaj is linked to the Social Democrats (CSSD), now the senior government party.
He was a CSSD deputy for seven years until 2009, when the CSSD, then the strongest opposition party, pushed through his nomination for the UOHS head without his CV proving the required qualification on his part. Two years ago, PM and then CSSD chairman Bohuslav Sobotka personally pushed through Rafaj’s re-election to the post, which met with critical reactions from some of the respondents in the GCR poll.
Besides, the GCR ratings focused on objective indicators such as the number of settled cases and the length of proceedings. For example, the UOHS needs 19 months on average to complete an enquiry into a suspected cartel, LN writes.
“The ratings turned the blind eye to the successes the UOHS has achieved,” Svanda said, complaining about the failure of the UOHS’s effort to improve its GCR ratings in the past two years.
However, on the domestic scene, too, the UOHS has been criticised for too long proceedings and for excessively dealing with public contracts’ details rather than suspected cartel agreements, LN writes.
